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Kerrie’s TAC ’12 Team Žá / Romantics Log | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5393 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 161 of 236 06 September 2012 at 7:23am | IP Logged | ||
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Warning: Rant ahead. You can skip this post, it really has nothing to do with my language learning. Actually, it does. Kind of. (But you can still skip it!) My sister is a teacher. We live in the United States, where just about every school system in the country is fighting budget cuts and all that fun stuff. (sarcasm, just in case you missed it) Her district sucks big time. You work for the government, our government sucks, so get over it already. Don't get me wrong. I don't mind being a sounding board if you need to vent. But then vent, and decide what you are going to do about the damn problem. If you can do something about it, then get off your a$$ and do something about it. If you can't do anything about it, then figure out how you are going to deal with it. There is a line drawn in the sand. Where venting turns into moaning and groaning and whining. And to me, that is the biggest waste of time. It drains your energy. It hurts no one but you. Not only is it not productive, it's harmful. Not to them, only to you. So get over it. Seriously. Okay, now you are probably shaking your head, wondering what this has to do with you. Nothing, really. (I warned you, didn't I?) But it has to do with me, usually for 10-12 hours a week. I kid you not. I plan my time (when the kids are not home and awake) down to every 15 minutes. Work, languages, exercise, work, cleaning, laundry, languages. And I plan my evenings like that, too. I have lists, I am organized so I can get things done. But then half an hour after the girls are in bed, just as I'm pulling out my Assimil lesson, the phone rings. Sometimes I turn the ringer off and send her to voicemail. Then she'll call back 10 minutes later. When I answer the phone, she starts talking. And she doesn't stop. (Seriously, you should see my Facebook page. Almost every night...... ♫♪♫♪♫♪ La-dee-dah. ♫♪♫♪♫♪. This is code for "Why did I answer the damn phone?!) I put her on speakerphone and set her down on my desk while she talks. Complains. About the same thing she complained about last night for two hours. About half an hour into it, I tell her I need to go. And she keeps talking. For another hour. I have entire conversations online while she is yakking at me. I spend hours looking at lolcats while she is whining. But I would rather be studying French, reading Spanish, watching an Italian movie, doing something productive. It wouldn't bother me if she actually had something to say, but it's like listening to a broken record. of music you don't like in the first place. This isn't the worst of it, though. She knows about my passion for languages. Most of my friends do - it's not a secret. Most people don't get it, and I don't expect them to. But at least they understand that it's important to me, and respect that. I don't know how many times she has said to me "Well, you don't have to do that." "Well, it's not going to get you anywhere anyways." "Why do you want to learn Bosnian? No one speaks that!" (Um, I see/hear it every day.) I don't expect her to understand. But you would think she could at least have a little respect for what matters to me. Okay, rant over. You can come back now for your regularly scheduled program. =) Edited by Kerrie on 06 September 2012 at 7:23am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6595 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 162 of 236 06 September 2012 at 1:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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Oh:/
I find that tedious conversations on the phone are a fantastic time to do my Anki repetitions. Or also, simply try to change the subject. Make it clear that you don't dislike her or anything, you'd just rather talk about something that you can discuss, not just listen. Have music on when talking to her. Tell her at least a bit of what you told us here. IDK what else... *hugs* 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5393 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 163 of 236 08 September 2012 at 6:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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Oy, please forgive my meltdown! I talked to my therapist and everything is alright now. :)
@serpent I was actually thinking about that, the night I was on the phone with her. I don't have any Anki decks that I'm using right now though, plus I talk aloud to myself when I am going through them. Although if I am quiet she might not hear me. LOL I was actually thinking of starting Anki decks for each of my focus languages, and adding 10 news words a day for each of them - either words from lessons I'm working on, from movies, or books. I have just been extremely lazy (um, I mean burnt out!) the last few weeks. Actually, the kids are finally back in school and things should get back to somewhat normal as far as my work and study schedule goes. If my work situation is the same next year, I'm going to have to find somewhere for them to go for at least a few hours every day. I'm hoping to finish French and Spanish Assimil in the next week or two. My original plans kind of got lost with my sanity the past few weeks, but I'm not that far off from finishing =) Just an update on the Super Challenge. In the first four months of the challange, Spanish - 19% finished French - 23 % finished Italian - 17% finished German - 4% finished Croatian - 10% finished Turkish - 3% finished Portuguese - 2% finished So for the three languages I have been focusing on the past four months, I am pretty close to where I should be, around 20%. I only plan on doing the half Challenge for German (or maybe 100 films, 50 books, and 50 writing), but since it isn't set up for that yet, I have it listed as a full Super Challenge so I can keep track of my writing. I just added the Portuguese challenge recently, and my Assimil course came in the mail earlier this week. I will finish Using French before I start working on it, though. I will likely try to do 2 lessons a day as long as I'm comfortable with the material. I don't expect it to be difficult. For Croatian and Turkish, I am just doing films for the Super Challenge. I want to read both of them eventually, but these are not focus languages for the time being, and I have other priorities right now. Like 10 of them. German, German, German. Please come back into my life. I have a date with you for half an hour every day starting on Monday. You'd better show up. In the lazy crazy state of stupor I've been in over the past few weeks, I started watching Korean dramas. Bad me. I smell another super challenge in my future. I ordered the Korean Assimil course last week, too. Just in case I don't have any other Assimil courses for Kanewai's Assimil experiment in November. Yea, that's it. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5393 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 164 of 236 08 September 2012 at 6:30pm | IP Logged | ||
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Oh, I should probably mention that I'm not doing the 6WC anymore. With my current goals, and spreading my focus between multiple languages, it doesn't really suit me. I'm a competitive person, so I try to stay at the top with my target language, then end up losing something else along the way.
I think for now, eight Super Challenges are enough for me, along with my own Assimil adventures. =) EDIT: grammar Edited by Kerrie on 08 September 2012 at 6:32pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Mani Diglot Senior Member Germany imsprachendickicht.b Joined 4903 days ago 258 posts - 323 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Swedish, Portuguese, Latin, Welsh, Luxembourgish | Message 165 of 236 08 September 2012 at 6:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hah! Ab Montag eine halbe Stunde Deutsch täglich? Da warte ich aber auf deine Einträge!
Vielleicht können wir die Assimil-Portugiesischkurse vergleichen, du Brasilianisch, ich Europäisch... :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5393 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 166 of 236 08 September 2012 at 6:56pm | IP Logged | ||
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@Mani Wow, my German isn't as bad as I thought. I only had to look up two of those words. =) I was actually looking at the European Assimil course at the beginning of the year (as well as Michel Thomas), but decided to look for something geared more specifically at Brazilian Portuguese, since I have a lot of friends (online) from Brazil. When I ordered my Korean Assimil book last week, I almost got the Armenian book, too. It was only like $17, but I decided I have enough Assimil courses for the next decade or two. =) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Kerrie Senior Member United States justpaste.it/Kerrie2 Joined 5393 days ago 1232 posts - 1740 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 167 of 236 08 September 2012 at 11:07pm | IP Logged | ||
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Here is an interesting article about a school district in Georgie (USA) requiring Mandarin for all its students. Some GA Schools Make Mandarin Mandatory More interesting than the article are the comments. It is amazing how polarized this country is, how people in this country get riled up over so many things, and how opinionated people are. Especially monolingual folks who are not educated enough about the issue to be entitled to an opinion on it. Okay, I take that back. They are entitled to an opinion about it, but seriously. Open mouth, insert foot. :-) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Julie Heptaglot Senior Member PolandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6901 days ago 1251 posts - 1733 votes 5 sounds Speaks: Polish*, EnglishB2, GermanC2, SpanishB2, Dutch, Swedish, French | Message 168 of 236 08 September 2012 at 11:40pm | IP Logged | ||
Maybe you just have to participate in 6WC with the aim to stay at the top in terms of total language hours. That's what I am doing, with my pitiful 20 hours (OK, 19 hours 58 minutes :)) of Dutch. That's not quite the purpose of 6WC but it is still a way to enjoy it, and I love the possibility to log my study hours (what am I gonna do when 6WC is over...?). Edited by Julie on 08 September 2012 at 11:41pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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